Day 7 – Ice Cream, Rain & RTI! – by Vicky

Second Week Begins!

So the first week of the Basing House dig has gone, and after a well-deserved Sunday break, the second week begins. Despite spells of rain, it did not dampen the team’s efforts with the trench dig and progress was made. This was seen especially in the tough far corner, which finally after a few days of mattocking and shovelling, the group finally dug through layers of ground and had successfully de-turfed a large area.

Morning trench shot.

Cap-Dan working hard with a mattock.

Education

Over in the education area, the chosen team worked well in preparing with activities for the public, including a ‘Smashing Archaeology’ game, where the object of the game was to place back together a smashed pot with masking tape- an inventive game that allows visitors to act like archaeologists!

There were also two very enthusiastic students who were dressing up as a Tudors.

Sophie and Phoebe posing as a Tudor man & woman.

Phoebe and Sophie enjoying the Tudor dressing up!

Ice Cream Break!

With thanks to the supervising staff, the team of both students and volunteers were served some lovely ice cream by two student volunteers. Despite it not being a particularly hot day, it was still a delicious treat, as a break from archaeological activities happening across the site.

Finds

There have been some interesting artefacts from the trench, ranging from a melted vintage Fanta bottle to a cow bone consisting of an ulna and radius. It is great to see such variety of finds, from different periods of time and I look forward in seeing what other awesome artefacts could arise from the main site.

Selection of finds.

Amazingly preserved cow bone found by volunteer Lucy.

An awesome melted vintage Fanta bottle.

Eddie and Alina happily working with finds washing!

Digitisation

Digitisation was an activity available for the first time. We were shown how the process of RTI occurs and given a chance to practice for ourselves. It was an interesting introduction to how digital processes are used in application of archaeology. For RTI, it simply using photography and a flash device to take pictures of (for example) a marking on the wall and then transferring it to a RTI Builder software that almost ‘translates’ the photos into a model, that brings out the detail. Unfortunately the set up was interrupted by some rain in the morning, but we prevailed by finding shelter and practicing under the shelter at base.